Monday, August 25, 2008

The Floor

In life, you are going to have good days and bad days. Today was an AWESOME day for me! It started off well with a delegation breakfast here in the hotel. The food was delicious, of course, which matters so much to a person like me (smile). Besides, perfectly cooked sausages and bacon and delectable pastries we were greeted by Ken and John Salazar, Pat Waak, Elbra Wedgeworth and a whole lot of other important Colorado representatives. I marveled at how smoothly everything went during the morning proceeding, especially the distribution of our delegate credentials. They are really quite simply made, but there are all kinds of codes embedded in them with information about whether a person is allowed to be on the "floor" of the convention center or just the "hall", for example. The credentials are like gold, however, so I hung on tightly to mine all day. See my picture attached.....soon.

I was interviewed by CSPAN during the day. They did 3, 4-minute interviews of me at different points during the day from a "day-in-the-life-of-a-delegate" perspective. Several of my friends and family members texted me to say that they saw me on CNN, but I think they meant CSPAN. Please let me know if you saw me on both! It was interesting to spend the day with a photographer. His questions were simple which allayed my fears of having to answer questions about intricate details of the Democratic party's platform. Somehow, I had built up in my mind that CSPAN wanted to ask me difficult questions about the Democratic party -- its intentions, its goals, and even its failures -- when the producer called me to ask if he could send a reporter to follow me all day. Isn't it interesting how we build ourselves up at such times? I really thought that he wanted me to enlighten him on some miniscule issue of the platform, but his questions ended up being about where I was going next and what I was having for breakfast! "Oh we have plenty of politicians for that" is what the reporter said to me when I told him what I thought he was going to ask me. We both laughed about that. The reporter's/photographer's name was Richard Weinstein....thanks for a wonderfully easy interview series, Richard. I'll try not to let my ego get in the way next time - ha, ha!

The lineup for the evening was outstanding....if you were watching, you saw the music of John Legend and speeches by Jesse Jackson Jr., Caroline Kennedy, Ted Kennedy, Michelle Obama and many others. Former President Jimmy Carter even made a surprise personal appearance. All I can say is that the experience on the floor is like none other: You can see the nervousness and poise of each person. Michelle was nervous...very rehearsed and very poised, but also nervous and that added to her likeability. Her children were nervous too and they didn't know which way to turn on the stage to face the cameras. At some point during all of the various speeches, almost everyone in the delegation teared up....even the men. I'm sorry to have to tell on the men, but you cried....you know you cried. Embrace the tears because this is a unique point in our history. I cried several times throughout tonight's festivities because I couldn't believe that I was in a place that I remembered from my childhood. I used to watch the DNC with my family when I was little and I used to wonder how the delegates got there....why were they screaming so loudly and why were they waving those funny signs? Now I know.

2 comments:

Wow! What a great start to the DNC! I didn't see you on CNN, but I'll keep looking. :-)

I would totally expect the same thing if someone was to interview me all day! I would be craming like I was taking an exam! (Must be the teacher in us, we're used to getting odd and/or difficult questions!)